Smooth Operator (Teddy Fay) (17 page)

A
bdul-Hakim drove the gray van up to the garage. He got out, unlocked the padlock, raised the door. He drove the van in, hopped out, switched on the lights, and pulled the door down behind him.

He had a moment of panic when he heard nothing in the empty garage. Then the hum of the freezer reassured him. He walked over to it, raised the lid.

The body of the dead sniper lay crumpled up inside. A thin layer of frost gave him a surreal look.

Abdul-Hakim nodded in satisfaction. He opened the back of the van and rolled out a gurney. He released the lever, pulled it up to full height, and rolled it over to the freezer. He took the body out and laid it on top of the gurney. The corpse was stiff and bent at the waist and wouldn’t lie flat. When he pushed the legs down, it actually sat up.

Abdul-Hakim exhaled noisily. This wasn’t going to work. He pushed the body back down, which flipped its legs up again. He ignored them and secured the torso to the gurney with straps. He rolled it into the shadows at the back wall and left it there, with the legs still sticking straight up.

He drove the van out of the garage, switched off the lights, and locked the door. He drove around, parked the van on the street, went into a diner and had lunch. He picked his way through a club sandwich, topped it off with a piece of blueberry pie. He lingered over coffee, checked his watch. It had probably been long enough.

Abdul-Hakim paid his check, and drove the van back to the garage.

Abdul-Hakim rolled the gurney out from the wall and positioned it under the overhead light. While not entirely thawed, the corpse was at least pliable. He was able to pull the legs flat on the gurney, which was a vast improvement. He rolled the body over and laid it on its stomach.

He got the medical bag from the van and went to work. With scalpel, clamps, and forceps he began digging for the bullet.

It wasn’t easy. The shot had gone through the back of the skull, and the bone was hard. He should have brought a hammer. He wondered if there was anything similar in the doctor’s bag. There was. A wooden mallet, not as heavy as he would have liked, but better than nothing. He banged on the scalpel, wiggled it around, enlarged the hole. Finally there came the satisfying rasp of metal on metal. He’d found it. Now to get it out.

He butchered the job removing the bullet. He’d been told it didn’t matter, still he hated to do such poor work. It just went against the grain. But he had neither the equipment nor the expertise to do better. He dug it out, popped it into a plastic Ziploc bag. Later he’d make sure to throw it away.

Now the hand.

Abdul-Hakim positioned the body on the gurney so the left arm lay flat from elbow to fingertips, palm down. He took a surgical saw from the doctor’s bag and cut the hand off at the wrist. It was amazingly easy. The fact that the body was still somewhat frozen actually helped. He put the severed hand in another Ziploc bag.

When he was done he rolled the gurney back to the van and loaded the body in. He closed up the van, locked the garage, and left.

He was back at one in the morning. He picked up the van and drove to a bar in the suburbs. As the van pulled up, three men dressed in black came out of the bar and climbed into the back. Once they were aboard, the van took off for Falls Church, Virginia.

There was no traffic at that time of night, and he arrived at his destination in thirty minutes. He drove by the house, double-checked the address, circled the block and came up on the house again. Before he reached it he pulled off into the shadows and cut the engine.

In the back of the van the three men in black propped up the dead sniper and strapped him into a suicide bomber’s vest. It
wasn’t armed, still they handled it gingerly. When they were done, they laid him down on the floor of the van.

Abdul-Hakim got out of the cab, came back to inspect their work. It met with his approval. He nodded to the man designated for the next task.

The man slipped out of the van, crept through the shadows to a private home down the street. There was a car parked in the driveway. The man stole up to the car, slipped a Slim Jim into the driver’s side window. Moments later the door lock clicked.

The man in black eased the door open, reached onto the floor for the release, and popped the trunk.

The van pulled up alongside. Two men in black got out, unloaded the dead sniper, and lifted him into the trunk.

Abdul-Hakim hopped out of the van, armed the suicide bomber’s vest, and closed the trunk.

He took the severed hand out of the Ziploc bag and wedged it under the driver’s seat. After the explosion, he wanted this small piece of Salih’s anatomy intact.

He locked the car, got back in the van, and circled the block. He parked in the same spot in the shadows where he’d been before, and settled down to wait.

H
erman Foster checked his voice mail. He had thirteen new messages, something to be expected after having sounded the clarion call. He skimmed them to see if any were important.

They weren’t. Some he deleted as soon as he recognized the voice. Some he saved without listening to them. During a lull, he might play them later.

Only one actually made the cut. Ironically, it was one he would have deleted if his hands hadn’t been occupied cutting his pancakes. That was from Congressman Greely, a stodgy old bore who merited no consideration whatsoever because he never had the gumption to do anything except vote the straight party line. Herman Foster was just reaching for the delete button when he heard him say, “. . . I wondered if there was something wrong
with the Speaker. He’s never canceled a dinner before, and I wondered if you’d heard anything.”

Herman Foster could think of any number of reasons to cancel a dinner with Congressman Greely, though it was unlike Congressman Blaine to miss a commitment. The Speaker was always the flesh-pressing type of politician, shaking hands and kissing babies.

Foster called Greely back. That was probably a first for him, calling the congressman. But if Speaker Blaine was canceling dinner appointments, that was something Calvin Hancock would want to know.

“Marty, it’s Herman. Got your message.”

“Yes, yes. Speaker Blaine was coming to dinner last night and he canceled, and I’m concerned because it’s not like him. And there’s been all this talk about the veterans aid bill and bipartisanship and you can’t turn on the TV without hearing—”

“Marty. What did he say?”

“He said he didn’t feel well. And this is a man who showed up to vote with viral pneumonia.”

“When did he cancel?”

“Last night. At the last minute. Alice was already cooking. It was like he’d forgotten all about it, made other plans, then realized he was coming to dinner. I’m worried about him. If he’s getting forgetful, it’s something the party will have to deal with.”

“Okay, thanks for calling.”

Herman Foster hung up the phone. This was not good. He’d have to call Calvin Hancock. Not now, it was too early, but soon.
This was the type of situation that would get worse the longer he sat on it.

Foster’s pancakes had gotten cold. He pushed the plate back, grabbed his briefcase, and went out the door.

He was halfway to his car before he realized he hadn’t said goodbye to his wife. She, as was her custom, had made him breakfast and gone back to bed. He wasn’t about to turn around now. He’d apologize this evening.

Foster unlocked the car, tossed his briefcase on the passenger seat, climbed in, and started the engine.

—

IN THE GRAY
VAN
down the street, Abdul-Hakim pressed the button on the remote control detonator.

Foster heard a faint beeping noise. He wondered what it was.

The car exploded.

T
he President’s national security briefing had virtually the same cast as it had for the assassination of Congressman Drexel. The new addition was the demolitions expert from the bomb squad, though it would be a while before he got a chance to talk. Clyde Benedict, the director of Homeland Security, was holding forth.

“Madam President, this is no longer an isolated incident. We are now talking about a coordinated terrorist attack against members of the United States Congress.”

“Despite the fact we have one sniper and one suicide bomber?” Kate said.

“Despite that. I think the situation is clear.”

“The situation is anything but clear,” Lance Cabot said. “Sorry to interrupt, Madam President, but there are only what can be described as special circumstances.”

“What special circumstances?”

“This is demolitions expert Roger McClarey. He’s done an analysis of what remains of the device, and his findings are interesting. Mr. McClarey?”

Roger McClarey cleared his throat. “The device used was your typical suicide vest, several separate charges designed to go off simultaneously, any one blast triggering the others. It is not a particularly sophisticated device, which is why it is popular. It could be detonated by a button wired to a single chamber.”

“That was done in this case?” Kate said.

“Apparently.”

“Then what’s the problem?” Clyde Benedict chimed in.

“Most suicide bombings fit a pattern. The bomber walks into a crowd where the bomb would do the most damage, and detonates.”

“In this case he was targeting a particular person.”

“Even so. He would walk up to him and detonate. He wouldn’t care where that was. He would pick the easiest access with the most possibility of success. He wouldn’t worry about collateral damage. In most instances, it would be the icing on the cake.”

The director scoffed at the logic. “So he blew him up at home. That’s where he knew he’d be.”

Roger shook his head. “That doesn’t make it easier, it makes it harder. You go to his office building, wait for him to arrive. When he walks into the lobby, you blow him up. Simple.

“Your way, the congressman comes out his front door. A
lone man approaches him. Someone he doesn’t know. A congressman’s already been killed, which puts him on his guard. Is he going to stand there and let an unknown man walk up to him?”

“That’s not what happened here.”

“No, it isn’t. The bomber waited in his car. All night, most likely, since after daybreak he would have been seen. To the best we can determine, which is hard since the whole car was blown apart, he curled up and hid in the trunk. He waited there all night for the congressman to wake up and start his car. When the car started, he detonated his bomb.

“The trunk is the worst possible place to put the bomb. You know you blow yourself up, but you can’t be sure of your target, though in this case enough explosive was used for any reasonable certainty. Still, it makes no sense. If you want to blow someone up when they start the car, you wire the ignition. This is not rocket science. Two-bit gangsters have been doing it since Prohibition.”

“You find that convincing?” the director said. “Car bombs can fail. When they do, you can’t do anything about it. If a suicide vest fails, a bomber on the spot can deal with it and find another way to detonate.”

“Do we know who this bomber is?” Holly Barker asked, trying to cut short the argument.

“We do not. We managed to save a fragment of a fingerprint and get a sufficient DNA sample to determine his probable ethnic origin.”

“Can you do that?”

“It’s not an exact science, but there are a few markers we can use as indicators,” Lance said. “The body was obliterated, but we were lucky enough to recover almost an entire hand. Tests are still being run, but preliminary results indicate the bomber to be of Middle Eastern ancestry.”

“So the sniper and the bomber are both Middle Eastern,” the director of Homeland Security said.

“That goes no further than this room,” Kate Lee said. “We will be releasing a statement, of course, but a preliminary finding of that sort would be highly inflammatory, resulting in widespread speculation and panic. We have yet to confirm the identity of the shooter, and our investigation into the bombing has barely begun.”

“I want all the details of the investigation, evidence, and up-to-the-minute findings forwarded to me at my office,” Holly said.

Lance gave her a look. “May I remind you you’re not running the CIA.”

“I’m briefing the President. If we have to convene a meeting like this every time there’s a new development, the government will shut down.”

“Well done,” Kate Lee said as Holly walked her back to the Oval Office. “Any meetings of this type that you can keep me out of I will greatly appreciate.”

“I understand. What do you think of the theory about the bomber?”

“It makes sense. It’s not helpful, but it makes sense.”

“It is a strange method for a suicide bomber.” Holly took a breath. “Madam President, I know you don’t like to play the mommy card, but if you’d like to grab some time with your son, why don’t you let me run interference and you take some now before things get crazy?”

Kate smiled. “I wish I could.”

“Why can’t you?”

“I have to reassure the American public.”

T
eddy Fay, Holly Barker, and Millie Martindale watched Kate’s speech in Holly’s office. Kevin left the connecting door open and watched it, too. Not that he couldn’t have streamed it on his computer, but he liked being part of the group.

Kate didn’t dwell on any of the inconsistencies of the bombing. She just presented a simple, direct picture. The United States had been the victim of a terrorist attack. The President had declared a state of emergency. All agencies were on high alert. These were the normal, sensible precautions taken at such times to protect the American people.

At the end of the President’s speech all the reporters began shouting at once, even though the President was not taking questions. As she turned to walk away, one voice could be heard above the rest. “Does this mean you’re shutting down Congress?”

“That’s the question, isn’t it?” Millie said. “If the vote never comes to the floor, what happens to the Speaker’s daughter?”

“Does the President know about her?” Kevin blurted.

They all looked at him.

“See, this is what is meant by a need-to-know basis,” Teddy said.

Kevin put up his hands. “Oh, no, no, no. I didn’t ask a thing. I was just wondering aloud. I’ll stop wondering.”

“Can you hear the phone from in here?” Holly said.

“Yes, I can. And even if I couldn’t, it’s being recorded.”

“But you wouldn’t know it had been.”

“Are you kidding me? When a call comes in, a giant picture of Alexander Graham Bell’s phone fills the screen. It stays there until I click it away. Trust me, I’m not missing any calls.”

The phone rang.

Kevin sprinted for the computer. The others followed him in.

Alexander Graham Bell’s phone was indeed displayed on the screen. Kevin clicked it away, revealing the decibel bars of the sound program.

The Speaker’s voice came over the phone. It quavered, as if he’d gotten up off his deathbed to answer. “Hello?”

Abdul-Hakim’s voice was ominous. “Don’t let them postpone the vote.”

There was a moment’s shocked silence while the words sunk in. “How can I do that?” Blaine wailed. “I have no control over that. I can make sure the bill passes when the vote is taken. I have the votes. You have nothing to fear.

“But when it’s voted on? How can I control that? They could postpone the vote, or decide to recess. The President could suspend Congress. It was hard before. Now another congressman has been killed. What do you expect to happen? I can control my party, but I can’t control what Congress does in the midst of a national emergency.”

“I don’t think you understand,” Abdul-Hakim said evenly. There was a pause before he spoke again, and when he did it was not into the phone. “Say hello.”

The tentative, fearful, hoarse voice of Karen Blaine came over the wire. “Daddy?”

“Karen! Karen!”

Karen suddenly screamed and dropped the phone. She could be heard sobbing in the background as it was picked up from the cabin floor.

“If the vote is postponed, she dies,” Abdul-Hakim said, and hung up.